I'm wondering if someone could supply some info about the Long Beach venue and area? How big is the facility. Is there parking? From what I can determine, there have not been too many competitors in the past. I wonder if they are ready for 2000+ ?

The last champs at Alexandria were good fun and enjoyed a few days in New York afterwards, this time I think we'll head up to Los Angeles post comp....maybe I'll get signed up to be in the movies if we drop in to Hollywood!

62 year old, 72 kilo (159lbs), 5'8''/174cm (always the shortest on the podium!) male. Based in Sussex, just south of London, England. Best recent rows 60 mins.....16011 metres. 30 mins.....8215 metres.

I'm hoping to get out there. Must research the costs of a place (with access to an erg) to stay and plane fares.

Book the Hyatt Regency through Regatta central,it's the main C2 hotel with the International meeting and all the training ergs, you also get a race entrants discount.

62 year old, 72 kilo (159lbs), 5'8''/174cm (always the shortest on the podium!) male. Based in Sussex, just south of London, England. Best recent rows 60 mins.....16011 metres. 30 mins.....8215 metres.

I'm wondering if someone could supply some info about the Long Beach venue and area? How big is the facility. Is there parking? From what I can determine, there have not been too many competitors in the past. I wonder if they are ready for 2000+ ?

The venue is the basketball arena for Cal State University Long Beach (CSULB).
Arena normally holds 4000 spectators but can go to 6k+
The school has nearly 40k students, so lots of parking.

Just saw the C2 blog with the new time standards to earn the $400 travel stipend. Wow! I don't recall all the previous years' time standards, but this year's are, for the 65-69 age group at least, FAST. I qualified the last two years, but no way I can do a 7:06.9 even if I were training this year, which I'm not.

A couple other things different I noticed; first, no Denver altitude adjusted times. Secondly, they changed the dates for age groups - guys like me with birthdays a week after the race, will be able to "age up", so a new crop of 64 years olds will suddenly be in the 65-69 group. Thirdly, there are a lot fewer C2 sanctioned (previously "satellite") regattas. Maybe they are adding them to the calendar as they get them, but the big Pacific NW regatta, Ergomania, is not even listed as a regional regatta.

Sigh. I guess the informal, go-to-have-fun, "championship" races are a thing of the past. As I said, I'm passing this year, but I'll be a very interested spectator here.

Wow! I don't recall all the previous years' time standards, but this year's are, for the 65-69 age group at least, FAST.

Yeah, the qualifying times are pretty ambitious. It would be interesting to know the formula for arriving at the times. The times are not undoable, but one had best be at the top of the rankings and within hailing distance of a WR. It may be a money saving move.

I've never gone to the WRIC, but have qualified every time I've tried [4 times]. This yr, just trying to row a few thousand meters every week without putting myself back in bed. JimG

AFAIK the heat sheet hasn't yet been generated. Regatta Central is handling the registration, etc. Its home page for the event says that a schedule + erg assignments was supposed to be available approximately 2/15. I have no firm idea why it doesn't seem to have been posted yet. However I suspect it's because competitors had until 2/17 to meet the time standards at qualifying regattas and request travel funding. Presumably they had to wait to accommodate anyone falling into this group.

As for the qualifying standards, one reason they were so fast this year almost certainly has to do with the change in determining "racing age." The format being followed at Long Beach assigns you on the basis of your age at any point in the calendar year, rather than according to your age on race day. This means that you get (say) people who turn 65 in (say) December racing in the 65-69 category even though they're biologically still 64. I suspect that the qualifying standards were calculated so as to take into account the possibility of people 'aging up' in this fashion.